It is always a pleasure to tread pastures new, especially
when the destination has been on the 'must do' list for a long time.

A fine sunny day saw us heading west from home to Cleator
Moor, turning down towards the delightful Wath Brow bridge which crosses
the River Ehen. The walk is listed in Wainwright's Outlying Fells book,
however despite being a sunny day, we did not see the "local residents
disporting themselves on the banks and in the waters of the River Ehen",
not today anyway !

A real stone bridge over the river.

An artificial stone chair overlooking the river
bank.

From the bridge we set out on a delightful walk, which
started with the easy but pleasant ascent of Flat Fell.

Nannycatch Road, before it turns into Nannycatch Lane,
looking back at the town of Cleator Moor.

The delightfully named Kinniside Cop seen through an old
gateway.

After the tarmac ends we continue a little further, then
branch off up Flat Fell.

This is the view back towards Cleator Moor.

Unseen from the main road, there's a large open quarry
close to the village of Rowrah.

It's history is probably based on Iron Ore but looks to
be extracting stone nowadays.

What I do know is that the disused quarry over on the
extreme right is probably the one that holds the Rowrah
Go-carting Centre.

Ann at the summit cairn on Flat Fell.

It's not very large, but then you are looking at the high
Fells behind anyway aren't you !

From the flat top of Flat Fell the path northward does
get slightly steeper

then suddenly we are standing on the brink of a deep,
hidden valley.

This is a large deep gash in the hillside with a diminutive
Nannycatch Beck making it's way slowly through. This must be an ancient
glacial overflow channel, now providing an impressive channel for the
more modern stream.

The road across the top of the picture is the Cold Fell
road over to Calder Bridge, Gosforth and the coast.

The joys of this walk continued to unfold as we dropped
down to Nannycatch Gate below Raven Crag.

Nannycatch Gate.

With strong, low afternoon sunshine the dogs are beautifully
spotlighted but the valley behind them is in shadow.

C to C is an indication of the Wainwright "Coast
to Coast" route which passes this way.

Rather than climb directly onto Dent Fell, we stayed in
the valley a while longer to enjoy the unexpected surroundings.

Autumn Fungus at the foot of a large Ash Tree.

This must be the photo that defines the best part of the
day.

The sky above is blue, and this is Raven Crag as we walk
along the hidden valley.

The C to C path seems well used here . . .

. . . but we leave it in favour of a steep ascent
of Dent Fell

The valley was so gorgeous in it's Autumn mantle, that we carried
on to experience it's sylvan beauty, then took an obvious but
steep path to ascend the ridge above which would take us upwards
to Dent Fell summit.

These diminutive toadstools were just two of many that we passed
on the way up to the open fell.

More pleasant walking followed, with lovely views towards
the high fells revealing themselves as we climbed.

This is Flat Fell which we had climbed earlier.

Westward we started to get views down the Irish Sea Coast
- This is the view across to Sellafield.

A tall steep ladder stile to get over the deer
fence

Harry insisted on climbing up to me. He had
to be helped down !

For those sharp eyed amongst you, there is a great big
hole in the fence next to the stile which the dogs (and sheep) could make
use of without climbing.

The wire had obviously been cut and removed. There was
also a recently cut padlock on the ground - all very strange.

Unfortunately the sun disappeared at this point but the
darker, rain bearing clouds headed south, leaving us with the occasional
sun
burst like this one over Beckermet. However it was kind enough to allow
us a dry ascent from here to the summit.

The stile on the boundary fence of the forest section
as we climbed Dent Fell.

From our elevated position, we now had a view of Scafell
and Scafell Pikes as a grey silhouette in the distance.

I was half expecting a round shelter but this cairn still
retains it's rounded pile-of-stones shape. The Ordnance Survey notes this
area as Long Barrow and if that is the case, this cairn could well go
back thousands of years. This is similar to the one on Grasmoor that the
National Park chap talked about recently, only the more exposed location
and the higher number of walkers there had modified it to a series of
hollow rounded wind shelters.

Leaving the top we head down towards Cleator.

Ann and the dogs wait as all the sheep decide to run across
in front of them.

Beware - anything may happen

They've been thinning the trees to allow extra
growth.

There's been much heavy machinery through here.

The sign as we make our way down to the road.

Black How Farm, and some old pig sties in what would have
been the old farm yard.

Out in the fields - there were actually two
fine pigs . . .

. . . who took an active interest in our passing.

Today's walk has been notable by being considerably more
noisy than usual.

We left Cleator Moor and the sound of traffic, on Flat
Fell we were entertained by the RAF, we were over flown by a large number
of commercial aircraft, and back here in the valley we were within earshot
of the road and the town again. Only in the valley behind Dent did we
actually have the peace and quiet that we usually find on the high fells.

A fine old Beech Tree alongside the road back
to Wath Bridge

Do you get the feeling we were being watched
?

As the dogs were a little dirty from their muddy trip
down through the forest, we directed them across the shallow River Ehen.

They didn't need much encouragement to get in and enjoy
the water.

Thanks to David
Hall and Andrew
Leaney for enticing us with their photos from this walk last April,
and to Ian who suggested it to us long ago !

- - - o o o - - -

Three days earlier we also managed a quick evening walk
up Cold Fell, another outlier just along the way.

Parking at Friar's Well cattle grid.

This short 260 ft climb up onto Cold Fell makes a great
little dog walk and gives fine views east into the high fells.

This is Haycock in the cloud and Seatallan clear of cloud
to the right.

The evening light gives the cloud a slight pink colouring.

Soon we were into a full blown westerly sunset as we reached
the top of Cold Fell.

Sunbursts and dark shadowy streaks radiate from behind
the cloud.

A wide view of the western seaboard sunset that night.

- - - o o o - - -

Technical note: Pictures taken with a Canon
G7 Digital camera.

Resized in Photoshop, and built up on a
Dreamweaver web builder.

This site best viewed with . . . the unexpected
pleasure of a hidden valley.